Friday, May 23, 2008

The motorcycle in cinema-THX 1138

THX 1138 is a 1971 science fiction film directed by George Lucas, from a screenplay by Lucas and Walter Murch. It depicts an Orwellian future, featuring three residents of a dystopia in which a high level of control is exerted upon the populace through ever-present faceless, android police officers and mandatory, regulated use of special drugs to suppress emotion, including sexual desire.

It was the first feature-length film directed by Lucas, and a more developed, feature-length version of his student film Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB, which he made in 1967 while attending the University of Southern California, based on a one and a quarter page treatment of an idea by Matthew Robbins.

THX 1138 shares themes with The Machine Stops, Anthem, Brave New World, Nineteen Eighty-Four, The Giver, Ira Levin's This Perfect Day and Yevgeny Zamyatin's We, and was inspired in part by the short film 21-87. The film was produced in a joint venture between Warner Brothers and Francis Ford Coppola's then-new production company, American Zoetrope. A novelization by Ben Bova was published in 1971.The tunnels used for the car and motorcycle chase scenes, were the Broadway tunnel in San Francisco, and the Alameda tunnel between the Oakland, CA. airport, and downtown Oakland.

The jet cars were actually Lola T70 Mark 3 race cars that had plastic bodywork added to look like they were jet powered. The same was true for the Triumph motorcycles witch had Avon fairings added to create a more futuristic look.